I finally finished copyediting my first manuscript, and I've now left it in the trusty(?) hands of the postal service. I had grown very attached to the manuscript, Women, Power, and Justice in English Renaissance Drama. I think I lucked out and got a great one. I happened to be taking a Shakespeare course when I got it, so I was reading plays while also editing new criticism on them. It was pretty cool. I must say, though, it was uncomfortable at first to correct and question the writing of professors who are far more advanced in their schooling than I am; but for this same reason, I found great delight in finding errors. Is that wrong?
I learned more about grammar this past month that I think I learned throughout all of my school years. Ask me anything :) I did spend way more time on the manuscript than I "should" have, though. I could claim a minimum of eight pages per hour (with an hourly pay rate), but I probably more realistically edited six pages per hour, considering all of time I spent pouring over the style manual I had to adhere to (but I, of course, only claimed eight).
I grew so accustomed to looking at words and sentences and to making edit marks, that it was difficult to look at other things without searching for errors or imagining edit marks whenever I wanted to make a correction--and I'm not just talking about words. It's like when you get used to using the "undo" feature in MS Word and Excel, you start to think you can just click "undo" in your daily life (other people do that too, right?).
I set such a rigorous pace for myself that I sort of checked out of society for a month. Now that I have the manuscript off my hands, I feel utterly bored. Hopefully I'll get another one soon!
I learned more about grammar this past month that I think I learned throughout all of my school years. Ask me anything :) I did spend way more time on the manuscript than I "should" have, though. I could claim a minimum of eight pages per hour (with an hourly pay rate), but I probably more realistically edited six pages per hour, considering all of time I spent pouring over the style manual I had to adhere to (but I, of course, only claimed eight).
I grew so accustomed to looking at words and sentences and to making edit marks, that it was difficult to look at other things without searching for errors or imagining edit marks whenever I wanted to make a correction--and I'm not just talking about words. It's like when you get used to using the "undo" feature in MS Word and Excel, you start to think you can just click "undo" in your daily life (other people do that too, right?).
I set such a rigorous pace for myself that I sort of checked out of society for a month. Now that I have the manuscript off my hands, I feel utterly bored. Hopefully I'll get another one soon!
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